Search results

Since the 1970s, gender has been a research focus in the field of comparative and international education (CIE) (Unterhalter, 2014). The extensive work on the issue of gender and access to education by academics and practitioners has proven instrumental in elevating the issue to the forefront of global educational policies (Assié-Lumumba, N. & Sutton, M. (2004). Global trends in comparative research on gender and education. Comparative Education Review, 48(4), 345–352). More recently with the goal of increased enrollment achieved and global improvements in gender parity, the focus has shifted from access to agency and empowerment (Assié-Lumumba, N. & Sutton, M. (2004). Global trends in comparative research on gender and education. Comparative Education Review, 48(4), 345–352). From policy to practice, CIE appears to advocate for inclusiveness, interdisciplinarity, and contextualization in research and practice. This chapter interrogates the assumption that CIE promotes these same concepts of gender equality, empowerment, and inclusiveness in the field itself. Through the use of data published in leading CIE journals, the following questions are addressed: How are issues of gender and power manifested and addressed within CIE-related research? Is research published in the field of CIE shifting and adjusting to changing societal gender norms? A critical examination of the role of gender in CIE scholarship and practice challenges the assumption that CIE professionals and researchers lead by example. In other words, although CIE professionals and researchers “talk the talk”, do they really “walk the walk” when it comes to gender and education?

This paper aims to examine the barriers that act as a hindrance and are the reason behind the struggles for the successful practice of diversity and inclusion. It also provides suggestions that organisations across the Asian region can adopt to have a conducive work environment to flourish diversity and inclusion.

Qualitative data were collected from 21 in-depth semi-structured interviews, where the male and female interviewee ratio was 6:4. The interviewees were diversity and inclusion leaders, diversity and inclusion consultants and human resources (HR) experts from Asian countries such as India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, UAE, Singapore, Bangladesh and Nepal. The interviewees belonged to varied industries, including information technology, automobile, manufacturing, engineering, logistics and independent consultants. Every interview recorded was transcribed, and an inductive content analysis technique was used using NVivo. Broad themes and several antecedents were identified which hinder the successful practice of diversity and inclusion.

There exists a patriarchal mindset in society as the main reason; that is why Asian countries are finding it difficult and are struggling to embrace diversity and inclusion successfully. There is a lack of awareness amongst managers about how inclusive gender diversity impacts the company’s financial status. Reports show that companies that have female board members have better profit margins in comparison to those that do not.

This study was conducted within one industry setting, the service sector; therefore, the findings may not apply to other industries because of the different organisational cultures and HR policies.

This study offers managerial implications that can help the organisation foster and embrace diversity and inclusion by overcoming the barriers.

There should be fair and equitable inclusivity of females in the workplace. Female employees should be heard without biases and discrimination and allowed to speak up with equity. Females should not be seen differently during organisational decision-making, participation and empowerment.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is one of the few to explore the challenges faced by Asian region organisations to embrace diversity and inclusion by empirical evidence. The study shows how the Asian region struggles to go beyond gender diversity and move away from patriarchal hegemony, which is the study’s unique contribution.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the Group Representation Constituency (GRC) system on the governance of Singapore, particularly in terms of equity and inclusiveness, accountability, and participation.

Historical review and election data from Singapore government web site are used.

The GRC system seems to be friendlier and fairer toward ethnic minorities than the traditional system. The GRC system also encourages political parties to be ethnically more inclusive. On the other hand, however, the GRC system has negative effects on opposition parties. A government cannot be called “accountable” if it lacks fair competition and sufficient popular participation.

The Singapore experience shows that, in practice, ethnic equality/inclusiveness and even political stability on the one hand, and participation and accountability on the other hand, can present conflicts. Which value should receive priority thus requires serious consideration.

Planning and design of university campuses is as important as the instructional philosophy of universities for determining academic and social development of university students. However, mainstream university campuses have often been designed with typical “normal” or “abled” users in mind and have neglected the needs of students with physical, sensory, and developmental disabilities. Universal design perspective with its equality, social inclusion and social justice agenda can be helpful in giving insights for inclusive educational environments. This study presents a research based design process conducted at a university campus in Turkey to create an inclusive educational environment for the students with disabilities, and to improve their participation in campus' academic and social life. For this purpose, existing campus spaces were evaluated for their inclusiveness both objectively through a checklist and subjectively through participatory workshops and meetings. The findings from both studies were used to identify the needs of the users with disabilities in the campus' settings. The results obtained from these studies were used to inform the implementations, and a holistic plan for creating an inclusive campus environment was developed. This study provides the implications for architectural and urban needs of users with physical, sensory, and vision disabilities or restraints in campus environments, develops methodology for future studies with similar context, and informs about the challenges and opportunities present in the process of creating inclusive university campus environments. .

This study aims to examine the association between board gender diversity (BGD) and workplace diversity and the relative importance of various board and firm characteristics in predicting diversity.

With a novel machine learning (ML) approach, this study models the association between three workplace diversity variables and BGD using a social media data set of approximately 250,000 employee reviews. Using the tools of explainable artificial intelligence, the authors interpret the results of the ML model.

The results show that BGD has a strong positive association with the gender equality and inclusiveness dimensions of corporate diversity culture. However, BGD is found to have a weak negative association with age diversity in a company. Furthermore, the authors find that workplace diversity is an important predictor of firm value, indicating a possible channel on how BGD affects firm performance.

The effects of BGD on workplace diversity below management levels are mainly omitted in the current corporate governance literature. Furthermore, existing research has not considered different dimensions of this diversity and has mainly focused on its gender aspects. In this study, the authors address this research problem and examine how BGD affects different dimensions of diversity at the overall company level. This study reveals important associations and identifies key variables that should be included as a part of theoretical causal models in future research.

Women's movements played a significant role in the recent campaigns for constitutional reform in the UK. Their aim was to overturn the prevailing male domination in politics. This article explores this process in Wales, a polity where the women's movement was comparatively weak and fragmented. In contrast to more familiar patterns of mass mobilization, “strategic women” used elite advocacy and “insider strategies” to engender the process of constitutional reform. Thus, this case study tests three widely held theoretical assumptions: that engendering state restructuring must be combined with broader activism; that insider strategies are more effective in influencing state actions; and, that the elite nature of such strategies means they can be neither democratic nor inclusive. The research findings detail the ensuing rise of state feminism and gains in women's representation and provide evidence of a paradox whereby elite action may translate into greater democratization in contexts where women's movements are comparatively underdeveloped.

This paper aims to examine the planning and policy processes in relation to the pollution in Lake Taupo. This paper describes and explains the manifestation of the tenets of deliberative democracy and the impediments of mobilising the tenets in the planning and policy-making processes.

This interpretive case study makes sense of interview transcripts, minutes of meetings, media reports and public documents and adopts deliberative democratic theory as the theoretical framework for the interpretive analysis.

Some factors fostered and others challenged the mobilization of the tenets of deliberative democracy. Local government processes facilitated the expression of multiple views in relation to the impacts of human activities on the Lake. Confrontations and tensions were inevitable elements of the deliberative processes. Pre-determined outcomes and domination of local authorities, aiming for environmental sustainability of Lake Taupo, posed as challenges to the operation of deliberative democracy. Some stakeholders need to sacrifice more than others, but recognition of pluralism, conflicts and differences is an essential part of deliberative democracy.

There is scarcity of research that empirically examines local government processes in light of deliberative democratic principles. The study also extends environmental and social studies that have explored the arena approach to accountability and decision-making.

This chapter discusses differences and similarities between democracy and populism with regards to their definitions, main goals, types of actors, structures, and main constituencies. Special focus is devoted to the functions democracy and populism play in the politics of sovereign countries. As the chapter argues, democracy calls for the implementation of political freedoms, rights, and political inclusiveness. In contrast, the spontaneous actions of populism appeal to popular agendas and often use disfranchised populations to achieve political goals.

Introduction − Covid-19, which first emerged in Wuhan, People’s Republic of China, in January 2020, with an unknown source, spread to all countries of the world very quickly and caused the death of over two million people world-wide. This ever-increasing global need for health care has created a radical transformation in terms of not only in health care, but also in all public services. Transportation services for the transfer of patients to health institutions, education services due to the dangers of face-to-face training, justice services due to the postponement of non-urgent court proceedings, security services in terms of restriction sanctions and all public services in general due to the disruption of access to public services due to flexible working hours applied to public personnel has entered into an unplanned provision.

Purpose: The aim of this chapter is to identify the problems that arise in the provision of public goods and services due to the global epidemic of Covid-19, and to bring a new interpretation to the theoretical discussions about the optimal delivery level of public services when there is a situation of communicable disease.

Methodology: The principles of public goods and service provision of G20 countries, Covid-19 mortality rates, indicators of the well-being of healthcare delivery such as the number of bed and personnel, the type and number of devices used to diagnose the Covid disease, and the public service restrictions taken to eliminate Covid-19, have been evaluated by employing descriptive analysis. In order to prevent income and advanced levels from becoming distinctive features, G20 countries with similar income and development levels were selected for this research.

Findings: Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been a distortion in the preference of provision of almost all public goods, and it has been observed that the delivery level of public services affects each other since all are linked like a chain. Failure to achieve what is expected from international organizations, which should be in a regulatory position in this regard, has increased concerns about the optimal presentation level of all public goods, especially health, in the future. As long as there is a global pandemic and countries do not take effective measures, a bad second best position that is far from optimal results but provides that instant solutions.